“Coach Wooden and Me” is a stirring tribute to the subtle but profound influence that Wooden had on Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as a player, and then as a person, as they began to share their cultural, religious, and family values while facing some of life’s biggest obstacles. From his first day of practice, when the players were taught the importance of putting on their athletic socks properly, to gradually absorbing the sublime wisdom of Coach Wooden’s now famous “Pyramid of Success”; to learning to cope with the ugly racism that confronted black athletes during the turbulent Civil Rights era as well as losing loved ones, Abdul-Jabbar fondly recalls how Coach Wooden’s fatherly guidance not only paved the way for his unmatched professional success but also made possible a lifetime of personal fulfillment.

Full of intimate, never-before-published details and delivered with the warmth and erudition of a grateful student who has learned his lessons well, it’s at once a celebration of the unique philosophical outlook of college basketball’s most storied coach and a moving testament to the all-conquering power of friendship.

These ideas come form the book by Henry Mintzberg “Managers not MBAs” (2004), and they are true for the coaches too.

“The key ingredient for management education is natural experience, that has been lived in everyday life on the job and off … The most powerful learning comes from reflecting on experiences that have been lived naturally … Every manager must discover for himself … what works and what does work for him in different situations.” (p. 247).

BUT

“Experience is not enough. People may learn little from their experience, unless they have a means for classifying and analyzing it (Sims et al., 1994) … John Maynard Keynes once quipped, ‘Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influences, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist.’ In other words, we use theory whether we realize or not. So our choice is between theory and practice, so much as between different theories that can inform our practice.” (p.249-250).

TAIS is a system for assessing attentional and interpersonal style and these data show that élites’ emotional overload is an important component reducing their performance, including world record holders, who instead suffer less the environmental distractions and cognitive mental overload. This also explains why top athletes use psychological preparation programs to reduce competitive stress.

Embedding physical activity in the undergraduate healthcare curriculum is an important step to building capacity in the future workforce to promote physical activity, every contact.
This podcast features two UK medical schools and schools of health describing their approaches to upskilling tomorrow’s healthcare professionals, in physical activity, for tomorrow’s patients using the #MovementForMovement educational resources and a community of practice approach.
More about Ann Gates here: www.exercise-works.org/.